The relationship between science and policy is neither automatic nor straightforward; it requires active navigation, mutual trust, and a willingness from both sides to engage across what can feel like very different cultures, languages, and timescales. When that navigation works well, research shapes decisions that improve lives. When it doesn't, the gap between what we know and what we do can have real consequences.
Flooding is one of the starkest examples of that gap in action. It is the most costly and frequently occurring natural hazard in the UK, affecting thousands of properties, livelihoods, and communities every year. Rivers are dynamic and meant to flood; they are natural features that wax and wane throughout time, changing size and shape, yet can cause devastating, and sometimes avoidable, harm if risks are not communicated effectively and therefore understood.
My recent research has focused on the ways in which sediment transport and river dynamics change flood hazard. However, science only takes you part of the way. Real impact—and by this, I mean benefit to people—comes from engaging with communities and the people who have power to make decisions.
One of the best routes to getting research to have impact is to work directly with those who have the capacity and ability to influence policy, from community groups to scientific advisors to Members of Parliament. Over the past few years I have been developing my understanding of how regulation and legislation works, what my role is as a scientist, and taking part in some excellent training opportunities—including serving as Policy Officer for the Geomorphology Division of the European Geosciences Union, working with colleagues to translate geoscience research into accessible outputs for policy audiences. One of the most important things that I have learned is that policy engagement is not a destination you arrive at once, but an ongoing practice that requires sustained commitment.
Learning how to engage with policy
In February 2026, I took part in the Royal Society Pairing Scheme, a "Week in Westminster" where scientists and civil servants from across the country come together to learn more about working in policy and pathways to be involved. I was fortunate to be matched with Robert McColl, Senior Policy Advisor for Clean Waters at the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (Defra). Rob's work centres on reviewing the legislative framework governing the use of sludge in agriculture. While this might sound distant from flood science, the underlying challenge is familiar: how do you make sound regulatory decisions when the evidence is complex, contested, and incomplete?
Whilst working with Rob for the week I explored the Defra main office, meeting members of his team working on the sludge appraisal. This included attending a workshop to provide feedback on upcoming legislation. As part of the scheme, various activities and workshops were held, from serious games to spending a few hours emulating different departments within government. What struck me most was the sheer speed and responsiveness required to rapidly assess and respond to emerging issues or topics: connectivity is key, but so too is knowing the right questions to ask the right people at the right time.
The Pairing Scheme has a cohort approach, providing the opportunity for networking across disciplines with both academics and civil servants. It was inspiring to be in a room of people all working toward the collective goal of improving decision making and ensuring that science makes its way into policy. It also made me acutely aware that the people in that room were, in many ways, the ones who had already found a route in, and that the voices missing from those conversations may be just as important as the ones present.
The Biggest Takeaway: Who Gets to Engage?
If I had to distil the week into a single insight, it would be this: the quality of evidence that reaches policymakers depends enormously on who has the time and the confidence to engage. Policy engagement is not equally accessible to all researchers. It demands time, institutional support, the right networks, and often a degree of comfort operating in unfamiliar environments. When engagement is driven largely by individual willingness and availability, we risk systematically losing certain scientific voices: those from earlier career stages, from under-resourced institutions, or simply from researchers who are too stretched to write a policy brief on top of everything else. That is a problem not just for individual researchers, but for the quality of the evidence base that shapes decisions affecting millions of people.
I have been fortunate enough to have the institutional support and encouragement to contribute to policy-facing documents. Some submissions would not have been possible without the backing of a wider team, as was the case when I contributed to a group submission to the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee in 2020, while others required having the capacity to write something independently, as with my written evidence to the Environmental Audit Committee in 2025. More recently, I contributed to a POST roundtable on nature-based solutions for flood and drought resilience, subsequently reviewing the full POSTnote (PN768) before publication, an experience that brought its own lessons about how scientific evidence is translated into accessible briefings for parliamentarians.
What I'll Do Differently
The Pairing Scheme has sharpened my thinking about what more purposeful policy engagement looks like in practice. Going forward, I am committing to three things:
- Developing a living policy brief on sediment-driven flood risk: a publicly accessible, regularly updated summary of the current state of the science that evolves as our understanding does. The evidence base in this area is moving quickly, and there is real value in having something that policymakers and practitioners can return to over time rather than a static snapshot.
- Supporting early-career researchers to engage with policy: because the assumption that evidence submissions are the responsibility of senior academics is both wrong and damaging. Early-career researchers are often closest to the latest science, and their voices deserve to be heard. I want to actively lower the barrier to entry for those who might not yet feel they have the seniority or confidence to contribute.
- Treating policy engagement as a priority: not simply waiting for opportunities to arise, but actively seeking them out. Policy engagement is one of the most direct mechanisms we have as researchers to ensure our work has meaningful impact beyond the academy. It deserves the same deliberate attention we give to writing papers or applying for grants.
A Final Word
The Royal Society Pairing Scheme is, in my view, one of the most valuable opportunities available to UK researchers who want to understand how policy actually works, not as a one-off experience, but as the beginning of something more sustained. Rob will be visiting Loughborough on 30 June as part of the Scheme's reciprocal exchange, and I am looking forward to continuing the conversation. Science-policy engagement is not something you do once and tick off; it is a relationship that must be built and maintained over time, and schemes like this one provide a rare and structured way to start.
For any researcher considering applying, and particularly for early-career researchers who might assume this kind of engagement is not yet for them, I would encourage you to apply. The Pairing Scheme is precisely the kind of opportunity that can shift your understanding of where your research can go and who it can reach. The science-policy interface needs more voices, not fewer, and the only way to change who is in the room is for more of us to walk through the door.
More information on the scheme is available at: https://royalsociety.org/grants/training-mentoring-partnership-schemes/pairing-scheme/